T206 Time Machine

[BobbyStrawberry]

Gray's Sports Almanac is all you need

[Mattymc727]

Where could you realistically bet on sports in 1910?

Originally Posted by BobbyStrawberry

Gray's Sports Almanac is all you need

[butchie_t]

Cash, and buy the tobacco company. Or at least a couple of them.

All cards, all the time.

[ullmandds]

Originally Posted by butchie_t

Cash, and buy the tobacco company. Or at least a couple of them.

All cards, all the time.

you'd have to bring cash older than 1909...which could be a challenge. i'd bring cigarettes...to trade for the cards.

[butchie_t]

Originally Posted by ullmandds

you'd have to bring cash older than 1909...which could be a challenge. i'd bring cigarettes...to trade for the cards.

Silver coins and gold coins. Not to mention paper money from that range of time as well. Fits right into the time frame.

[raulus]

Originally Posted by butchie_t

Cash, and buy the tobacco company. Or at least a couple of them.

All cards, all the time.

So let's say that you manage to buy up millions of mint T206 cards, and bring them back to the present. Including a gigantic stash of Wagners.

Does your intervention suddenly impact the market, like with the BSF, except with a much larger existing supply and demand?

And does a T206 Wagner no longer have the same cachet?

[butchie_t]

Originally Posted by raulus

So let's say that you manage to buy up millions of mint T206 cards, and bring them back to the present. Including a gigantic stash of Wagners.

Does your intervention suddenly impact the market, like with the BSF, except with a much larger existing supply and demand?

And does a T206 Wagner no longer have the same cachet?

It would at least go a long way in explaining the apparent scarcity of the Wagner card. Regardless, there would still be money to be made off of the cache that would be brought 'back to the future'.

[nat]

You've got to be sure that you don't snag too many cards. If a set gets too rare, set collectors write it off as impossible, and so the price drops. Price, of course, is a product of supply and demand, but demand, especially for collectibles, is not independent of supply.

(Probably not for anything? If oranges were super rare, we'd probably just think of them as rare curiosities, rather than as things you might realistically snack on. And so people wouldn't want to buy them, hence their price wouldn't rise as much as you'd expect given their rarity.)

Now, they made enough T206 cards that this probably won't be a problem. You'd need a really big deLorean to haul home an appreciable share of the T206 cards manufactured. But, in principle, watch out for second-order effects like this.

Also, as for buying stuff in 1909. Just take period currency. Looks like you can get half dollars for $20 on ebay. (I assume that these are terrible prices, just like most ebay baseball cards.) A pack of smokes cost, what, a nickel in 1909? So you'll be paying $2 per T206 card if you go that route.

[Ronnie73]

Being a coin and currency collector, I've thought about this idea many times for many things. The cheapest coins would be the Morgan silver dollar from 1878 to 1904. Liberty V nickels from 1883 to 1908 would be a cheaper option, and the Barber dimes from 1892 to 1908 would be a decent option as well. Those 3 options would run you $25 to $35 in todays price, for a dollar face value that could be spent during the 1909-1911 time frame.

[bmattioli]

Buy turn of the century Silver coins in the .10 and .25 cent pieces. Easy exchange for packs..

[JollyElm]

Every single person is wrong so far.

Don't hide from it, flaunt it!! The only way to approach this scenario is to dress casually in your normal clothing...perhaps dazzle everyone by donning a t-shirt with Farrah Fawcett in the red bathing suit on it, and a Mets (or your preferred team) hat. Bring Pop Tarts and all sorts of snacks to hand out, and a comfortable chair. Perhaps have some 'Seinfeld' DVDs to give out (since you can't really do much with DVDs anymore). Set yourself up in the most tobacco-est area possible of a town or city and let it be known that you will wow anyone who gives you tobacco cards with fantastic tales of the future.

A second option is to bring with you many thousand-count boxes of 1990 Score cards (only commons, of course, because these 1910 idiots don't know who the stars are/will be) and tell the kiddies, "I will give you 10 incredible futuristic cards for every silly, worthless and 'new' tobacco card you give me."

Word will spread like wildfire, and your only problem will be how in heck do you get back to the time machine with the incredible amount of booty you've scored.

[bcookie]

you arrive the same way Arnold Schwarzenegger did in Terminator and buy clothes with all of the pre 1909 Morgans you brought.. Once clothes are acquired, you proceed to but 20 packs of cigarettes per Morgan.

cheap morgans are about $30 right now so you will get 20 MINT cards for $30.. not bad.

[KJA]

Originally Posted by JollyElm

Every single person is wrong so far.

Don't hide from it, flaunt it!! The only way to approach this scenario is to dress casually in your normal clothing...perhaps dazzle everyone by donning a t-shirt with Farrah Fawcett in the red bathing suit on it, and a Mets (or your preferred team) hat. Bring Pop Tarts and all sorts of snacks to hand out, and a comfortable chair. Perhaps have some 'Seinfeld' DVDs to give out (since you can't really do much with DVDs anymore). Set yourself up in the most tobacco-est area possible of a town or city and let it be known that you will wow anyone who gives you tobacco cards with fantastic tales of the future.

A second option is to bring with you many thousand-count boxes of 1990 Score cards (only commons, of course, because these 1910 idiots don't know who the stars are/will be) and tell the kiddies, "I will give you 10 incredible futuristic cards for every silly, worthless and 'new' tobacco card you give me."

Word will spread like wildfire, and your only problem will be how in heck do you get back to the time machine with the incredible amount of booty you've scored.

Depending on the size of the time machine you could bring lots of Pop Tarts and open a Pop Tart restaurant which will be super successful with all the flavors, then you become rich, acquire goods. Then you return to the present and not only will you have plenty of cards but there will be a History Channel documentary on your Pop Tart creations and super successful restaurant.

[BobbyStrawberry]

Originally Posted by Mattymc727

Where could you realistically bet on sports in 1910?

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but pre-Black Sox, I believe gambling was quite prevalent around the game. (Although not officially sanctioned the way it is now.)

[Mattymc727]

You certainly have to start with something other than cash. 2023 cash is funny money to someone in 1910.

Gold won’t work either. Were silver or diamonds more valuable then?

Food might be a commodity. Modern food production probably makes something super cheap in 2023 very valuable in 1909…

[BobbyStrawberry]

Originally Posted by Mattymc727

You certainly have to start with something other than cash. 2023 cash is funny money to someone in 1910.

Gold won’t work either. Were silver or diamonds more valuable then?

Food might be a commodity. Modern food production probably makes something super cheap in 2023 very valuable in 1909…

You could get a job! Start making bets and Biff Tannen your way to the top.

[Fred]

Why bring anything. I guess you'd figure out a way to get $$. Rob a bank, whatever (ok, bring an assault rifle with you).

Then why bother with buying the cards. Go to the lithography print shop and run a few hundred sheets. Make sure to include all the top error cards and the big four in your print runs. Make sure you have a lot of the tough backs and all the HOFers in large quantities. Create a Honus Wagner with a Honus Wagner back while you're there.

Also, be a nice guy and tell Addie Joss to get himself checked out and prevent his death. Why stop there, while back in time, visit Austria and find out where Adolf lives and plan an accident ahead of time so he doesn't make it to Germany in 1913. I guess according to Doc Bown, that that would screw up the entire space-time continuum, and in the modern day, nobody would give a crap about pictures of dead guys on cardboard and you'd have a worthless stash of lithography that nobody wants and you'll be wishing you went back to the 1950s and picked up Pele rookies.

oh, got a little carried away there...

[Mattymc727]

Originally Posted by BobbyStrawberry

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but pre-Black Sox, I believe gambling was quite prevalent around the game. (Although not officially sanctioned the way it is now.)

You are probably right, although i thought it was “illegal” back then. Be careful not to get the bookies and gangs on your tail for taking advantage of them!